Wellness Bill

On May 1, 2015 The Boston Globe published an article titled The Wellness Bill in Congress Raises Privacy Concerns.
The article addresses the invasion of privacy that will be allowed if the bill passes. This allows employers to not only screen potential employees, but also current employees about their own family medical history. Not only does this expose people to admit to medical issues they would rather not disclose, but it also makes it easier for employers to turn down those who have a higher chance of becoming ill at some point in their career. These people may need these jobs more than anyone else for that exact reason. Discrimination at this level is just as bad as if it were about race or religion. There are also many diseases or disorders that are very common and easy to manage with proper treatment, therefore they should not be taken into account when selecting a potential employee, or choosing who should be let go in an office. That can be easily said, but if the employer in question has application A a healthy individual with good qualifications and no family history of disease, or application B a individual at genetic risk for diabetes or heart disease, we can infer that he will more than likely choose applicant A. This type of information is personal and unless someone is willing to disclose it for their own health assessment it should remain that way.

This is a response to a blog post by my colleague Azucena, titled The United States and its problems, published on April 3rd, 2015.
You have a lot of good points, however you could do more to persuade the audience, and be a little more specific. For example, I cannot really tell who your audience is. You have a lot of vague subjects that could be aimed at addressing a large number of people, but the farther you narrow down your audience the more persuasive you will seem, or at least to that audience in particular. There also could be a much more specific topic that you choose in order to get down to the real details that support the point you are trying to get across. In the first paragraph I think you could eliminate some subjects, assume I am stupid, because for all you know I could be right? Well if that is true, how is America a threat to other countries? What real threat does ISIS pose to our nation? Later in the second paragraph you mention something about the House trying to involve our nation's safety in the immigration debate. I was only able to draw this conclusion because of prior knowledge of the topic, but again, you should assume I have no idea what you are talking about, tell me about what Obama had in mind with this bill and why, or how congress is opposing it. Lastly our government is not organized in such a way to have legislation passed easily, disagreement harbors further thinking. We need to truly decide whether the bill in question is what is best for our country, it should not be an easy thing to change or make laws unless it is an emergency that needs immediate attention. More plainly our president and Congress will not agree until the parties of the two branches are one and the same.

Minimum Wage There for a Reason?

Obama has been pushing for an increase in the federal minimum wage, though it has not made headway with congress. Some states, however have decided it is time to raise their regional wage. Bridging the gap between the poor and the wealthy is a noble cause, but it has its downfalls. Mark Wilson of the Cato Institute wrote an article titled The Negative Effects of Minimum Wage Laws on June 21, 2012. We need to think about who truly benefits from this policy if we are to understand it's effectiveness, according to Mark "Only 20.8 percent of all minimum wage workers are family heads or spouses working full time". The remainder of those people consists of either kids, or young people in college. We tend to believe that the people working for minimum wage are typically poor and need the money to raise their family, but these people make up less than 10% of the minimum wage workforce.

Raising the minimum wage does not affect workers in the way that we would hope; in many cases it causes an increase in unemployment. The minimum wage is there for a reason, so some businesses are able to function. With an increase in minimum wage labor cost will go through the roof. Businesses are less likely to hire, and with the increase in wages the job market becomes more competitive. people who have little to no skill are given the boot, and those with high skill are hired. If the people we intend to receive these wages do end up getting this wage boost, they won't be given nearly as many hours, benefits will disappear, and job training will decrease.

This policy is just a way of getting ahead in a political campaign. Several studies have shown how a minimum wage increase either does not do anything for the poor, or it makes things worse. A lot of the poor in our country are unemployed, or if they are employed they already make above minimum wage. Those who are less skilled will be pushed out of the workforce, and lastly, if prices rise to compensate for the wage increase the poor will suffer these costs more heavily.

The plan to increase minimum wage only appears to be a genuine cause.

Abortion before human trafficking?

On March 13th, 2015, Red State published a blog titled Democrats Put Abortion before Helping Human Trafficking Victims.
The author of this post is an orthodox christian named Jake, who has a masters degree in history living. He is conservative, and this post is geared towards a Conservative audience. The issue of abortion is very partisan with the left being pro-choice, and the right being pro-life.
The post argues that Liberal senators are not willing to cooperate with a bill to aid victims of human trafficking, because of an amendment in it that prohibits the funds from being used for abortions. According to Jake, the Liberal leaders were at first willing to stand by the grant, but this was only because they had not read the document well enough. It goes on to give direct quotes from Democratic senators who, upon discovery of the anti-abortion language in the bill, plainly refused to pass it. If these quotes are real it is shocking that these representatives are so unwilling to entertain this bill, just to show their loyalty to their pro-choice following. It makes sense that the federal government would not be willing to cover abortions for the victims, if it is a big problem then there likely are many victims. Abortions for every victim would be very costly for a nation already in high debt.
I am very surprised by the content of this post. I am pro-choice myself, however Jake did well in convincing me that what the senators are doing is wrong. The use of the quotes, as well as showing how at first they were willing to back the bill, are good arguments. I think he did well in showing us that the only reason these senators will not pass this is because of the clause about abortion. It goes to show how far politicians are willing to go to look good, the Democrats will take what they did out of context and show it to their audience as if they did something noble. I wonder if people's minds would change if they were given the bigger picture.

On February 27th, 2015 The Washington Post published an article titled The exquisite hypocrisy of GOP Medicaid expansion rhetoric by Stephen Stromberg.

The author of this article argues that Republican leaders are quick to shoot down the idea of Medicaid expansion programs in their states. Their point of view is very consistent in that they do not believe that a federal government with such excessive debt, is in any position to offer this kind of deal to the regional governments, and years later will not even be able to continue funding for the project they started. This article is intended for a Liberal audience, the idea of health care for everyone in and of itself is a Liberal concept. The article's author is arguing for Liberal ideas as well, at least in this instance. He has been chiefly an editorial writer, so it is to be expected that strong opinions would come out of an article written by him. To capture the audience, he had to provide evidence as to why he believes the GOP is at fault, this only helps his argument.

The argument is backed by showing that the states that refuse to cooperate with this new program, are some of the most heavily reliant on federal government funding. In some of these states federal funds make up nearly half of that state's revenue. This article lays with my own beliefs and captured me as an audience, however it could have been drastically improved by giving us some evidence of how liberal states are reacting to the Medicaid expansion program, do they differ in opinion completely? Or are there some gray areas where Liberals find this program to be just as daunting as their Conservative counterparts? Showing both sides of a political issue is important to remove bias, and make a more concrete argument.

The conclusion of this argument seems to be just a controversial flashy ending, that captures the essence of political drama perfectly. I do not believe that Conservative leaders would turn something down purely because Obama's name is attached to it. This is the weakest part of this argument, and if that is the state of our nation then we are in bad shape indeed.

Racism in the police force.

On Thursday, February 12, 2015 New York Times published an article titled

F.B.I. Director Speaks Frankly About Police View of Blacks.

In this article the leader of the F.B.I. James Comey, addresses the issues of police attitudes towards young black men. He talks about how regardless of the race of the officer, these people meet face to face with criminals on a daily basis, and the majority in certain neighborhoods are black. James states that although it is wrong, people grow accustomed to associating these type of people with others of the same color that they have previously dealt with. He goes on to clarify that some officers should still be held accountable for their actions. A lot of people of high stature, have gotten into big trouble for commenting on race, but Mr. Comey is taking this opportunity to bring people together instead of taking a bias stand point. He mentions how schooling and employment could change lower class black lives, and that this is not their fault, but the fault of the government not providing these people with the proper tools to prosper. This article is important because it sheds light on a situation from a different perspective. It does not in any way advocate these officer's actions, but rather gives us a new way to think about the situation. We must come together as a nation to resolve these issues not split apart.